87 replies to this topic

[GuntherK]

Creepy, on 12 June 2012 - 06:11 AM, said:

Made a few changes, did some cleaning.



Extended the backpack as suggested, added mooring loops (whatever those are called -there would be a pair somewhere on the back of the mech as well -tow cables are probably back there too), Base of the cockpit/neck has been "up armoured", the hip area's still being hammered out...


I don't believe I've had the pleasure/misfortune of meeting Erratic Cheese but I admit the crotch was sticking out a bit too much. It sort of came out that way when I tried to get more slope for deflection and armour depth...

It realy looks nice.
Its a cyclops, but with some realy fresh and original ideas. I realy love the whole cockpit on neck and head area.
But the torso, arms and legs look sweet and balanced too.
Well done.

[Creepy]

So I went ahead and made the changes to the head. Some of you folks liked the idea of the cockpit sitting under a sensor turret and I should apologize for that switch up. I figured that I should move a little closer to the original design on that one (even though it makes a pretty obvious shiny target -but then don't most windows?) The neck was pulled in a little bit with the changes -I think it was making the mech look a little strange proportionally. I went with a wedge in the neck because I noticed a shot trap which still hasn't been completely addressed.

-That small pocket under the "eye" is an additional sensor cluster. Also, the clarify, I moved the cockpit back into the eye to bring it more in line with the original design.

Anyway, unless someone has some major feedback with what I have laid out, I'll probably start finalizing it. I'm thinking I'll probably rough out some mass in 3D to help with the straight lines. It seems all the rage. Or something...

Quote

I noticed some of your head ideas looked very similar to the Phantom Labor from Patlabor.

Well, it's either that or the Tetra Gerbera as I mentioned ;p But yeah, both of them are on my (big) list of favorite mechs.

Thanks for the feedback so far, folks!



-Forgot to add that the "eye lids" are a 4 piece shutter system so as not to crowd the pilot. I'm going to need to sit down and tinker with it to make sure it actually would work. A 2 piece doesn't work for sure.

Edited by Creepy, 05 July 2012 - 03:08 AM.

[DerMaulwurf]

With the cockpit moved to the "head", the long neck starts to stick out visually. I would propose to move up the torso-neck line.

Can't wait for the final version.

[MadMarauder]

I loves its!!!!!

[Creepy]

I wonder if people know what to do with the spoiler buttons. Then again, I did pile on a lot of notes in that post, so I'm not terribly surprised I didn't get much feedback on that. Not that there was much to discuss beyond the cockpit I guess.

Anyway, here's the latest iteration. Not a lot of changes, of course. I'm going to have to screw around with the legs some more but I'll do a layout in 3D first I think. The neck's been adjusted a little bit, shortened by increasing torso real estate. I'm pretty sure it has less neck than the original. I was toying with the idea of extending the neck ridge down the torso but I think it came out looking a little funky



I'll need a couple of weeks to lay out the initial 3D stuff I think.

[DerMaulwurf]

While the neck on the original is quite long, it is also quite thin and points a bit forward. Only the image in the TRO 3050 Upgrade has a thick neck, which I do not like too much esthetically (although it makes sense in terms of construction). If you extend a thick neck too much downwards, you risk eseentially creating a no neck look, which is strange in its own way. But all in all I think your current mixture of the neck/upper torso looks very good and does not need much more tweaking. With the additional detail this section is looking quite complete.

Since the legs are becoming more angular with more iterations, you might also want to consider reworking the lower arms for a more unified look. I think the way your taking the design really connects the visuals to the original which is also quite blocky (except for the head of course).

[Max OConnor]

Any new updates on your Cyclops redraw? I'm anxious to see the finished version.

[Zaptruder]

Shame this was forgotten about. It seemed to have a pretty interesting vibe and flavour to the design. Bit tall for Mechwarrior purposes, but definetly does well as a Cyclops inspired mech.

[Creepy]

Not forgotten. I made mention in the BWC Pilot Concept Thread that I'll be picking it up once things clear up a bit. Some things in my plans have shifted but I do intend to do some posting here this month. I've also made more changes to the head. It's a little less round in the redo. Other parts of the mech, I've decided to adjust while hashing it out in 3D. In that regard, I only had time to fiddle around with the eyelids to figure out how to make them work mechanically without crowding the cockpit.

Thanks for the interest -another post should be up I think in a couple of weeks!

[Creepy]

Managed to squeeze out some time earlier. It's a start..



I'm going to start with what I imagine to be a "stock late production" model without the schurzen field kit.

I find myself wondering if I should go back to a turret. If a similar design were to be put into MWO, it would be distinct for sure but also it would have some quirks: The field of vision might be a little tighter but the aiming coverage would potentially be superior as the head allows the pilot to keep the arm reticle and the area around it in view farther. (I think I butchered that sentence..)

I'll update this post with a thumbnail sketch or two in about.. 7 hours or so. There were a few changes to the head (again. ..actually, you can see there are some differences to the last posted 2D version)

More to come this weekend as well, I think.

---

So I went over some thumbnails and most of them won't make much sense to everyone else so I took the two most readable images, minus a few notes for this post update.

Top:
- This is a fixed head version. It's not really readable but the rounded section has been replaced by an 'up armored' angled design.
- The horn/stud you see above the "eye" is a periscope.
- The cockpit "glass" is shown covered here and has a slot cut to accomodate the periscope, so it's not complete coverage, though I do have some notes that has the slot set up with a two piece sleeve to cover the gap.
- There's an armored plate on the side of the cockpit 'bezel' that's meant to be a slot for improved visibility but I'm thinking of canning that in favor of reinforcement -especially with the turret design
- There's a pull down ladder in the style of aircraft but I'll be switching that out for a more robust design. Hand holds in the 'head' will be the fold out shelf variety

Bottom:
- This is a turreted model, which I'll probably be modeling instead but with a few changes.
- The swing out stereoscopic sights are of an early design. I imagine this is one of the first features to leave as the Inner Sphere destabilized and conflict became more widespread, increasing the demand for faster production and lower cost. The stereoscopic sights will be replaced by fixed sights, wich are more practical for many reasons -maintenance, durability, faster and cheaper production... They're good trade offs for convenience in profile that mostly impacts transport.
- You can't really see the notches in the neck but those are locking hooks mainly used for transport purposes.
- Sensor cluster below the "eye" shares similarities to the cluster found with the Atlas

Edited by Creepy, 18 January 2013 - 01:15 AM.

[Creepy]

WIP..



No fixtures have been added yet. Not sure how I'm going to budget the poly count at the moment but the idea is to keep this on the low end so as to make it possible to drop into the game.. That said, I'm only keeping half an eye on the count and will be doing at least one pass on optimizing. No smoothing groups put in yet.

Still need to work in the fixed stereoscopic viewports and a few other little things around the head area. Some of that stuff's going to be dropped in as a texture or probably a normal map.

I'll probably have a torso roughed/massed out before I get the detailing in.

Edited by Creepy, 21 January 2013 - 01:35 PM.

[Waylandx]

Great Job so far!

[DerMaulwurf]

Glad to see that this work is progressing again.

[Kyryos]

Looks great. Would buy this mech if it came out

[Creepy]

Been a bit busy but I figure I should drop an update pic anyway (trying to post once a week because I'm sort of crappy about regular posting.)
I'm hammering at a few design ideas but the torso's geling nicely. Mostly have the mass in but there are a few points in the shape I want to work out. The left and right torso section's general shape isn't fully defined yet but I should have that in for next week. Something I want to address is a "shot trap" around the neck area. The "collar" that extends into the "backpack" was an element taken from the original design but I went with sort of a pancake shape. I'll probably close the gap between that and the neck. It should also help to satisfy you neck haters out there lol!
About the left and right torso: I had contemplated incorporating a pylon system to mount the weapons but that would bring it into omnimech territory as much as it might make sense to do so...

As always, questions and comments are welcome, and thanks for the responses so far!

---

edit: Was up for a little bit longer thinking about this thing and hammered out another iteration. The collar-to-backpack element still needs some work I think...



The pack element was raised a bit more here. Something akin to the original design.
As per the previous iterations, I'm going to try to preserve the angles in the left and right torso but I'm not sure if it'll work out. Real estate for a pair of rotary launchers is looking tricky so I might redesign the loading system. Then again, I suppose the torso is where symmetry breaks down anyway...


.

Edited by Creepy, 28 January 2013 - 04:05 AM.

[JoeKano]

I like what your doing with the upper half, I like the Rotary launcher on the missiles idea, nice , the head i think is coming along nicely.

I don't like your limbs but then I struggle to do mech limbs well when I draw so meh who am I to talk. Just not seeing the arms and legs, They aren't coming up right. The hand thing is a good concept however the Forearms just dont look right IMO. The upper arms you have blocky, the forearms rounded, not feeling that.

The legs seem good, I'm just being put off by the knee shields flexing look on them. Like they bend to keep the Knee Actuator fully covered, You don't really see that I think on a lot of designs, most of the ones I am thinking off seem to have them more fixed at an angle from the lower leg. I'm thinking the engineering would be quite tough on that. There a few designs that mount the knee pads on the actuator fixed forward regardless of flex I think, I dont recall any coming down though, which I suspect they normally go up from the lower limb to protect from Infantry trying to toss satchel charges in for knee capping.

Keep it up Creepy impressive work so far.

[Creepy]

Just a quick reply (I have no idea why I'm still up -it's 4am)
Most of the joints are universal joints and part of the idea is that they're paneled for replacement purposes. Yeah I agree the arms and legs are all kinds of whacky. To be honest, I wasn't feeling a lot of the elements in the arms, legs, or the torso. Anyway, I thought I mentioned somewhere I was planning on redoing all that stuff in 3D but then who's going to read through all that mess I typed anyway? ;p

I have a few thumbnails laying around with reworks on them but haven't bothered to post them as they're really rough. The shoulders and arms will be boxier for sure and I think I'm going to be going with a version of the legs I have roughed out that looks kind of like the Centurion's due to a tapered look.

[Bishop Steiner]

asymmetrical is one of the features I like in Battletech anyhow..... function should trump form... sadly, the TROs usually had neither....

[Monky]

I'm sad that the bunker cockpit has gone the way of the dodo

[Dirus Nigh]

The barrel of the auto cannon looks a little small to me, or maybe it's the size of the bore. When i look at it I don't think AC20 or gauss rifle. An AC5 is what comes to mind.

Every thing else is coming along very nicely.

Edited by Dirus Nigh, 31 January 2013 - 09:20 PM.